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Curious Business: The B2B Growth Podcast

Curious Business: The B2B Growth Podcast

By: Stephen Morris | B2B Growth Podcast Host
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Summary

Curious Business is the B2B growth podcast for B2B leaders and marketers with ideas and insights to help you think differently about your business, its challenges and opportunities. B2B marketing expert Stephen Morris talks to entrepreneurs, leaders and experts to uncover business inspiration, marketing insights and growth ideas that you can apply in your business.

Copyright 2026 All rights reserved. Economics Leadership Management Management & Leadership Marketing Marketing & Sales
Episodes
  • How to Perform In The Moment with Neil Mullarkey, ImprovYourBusiness

    How to Perform In The Moment with Neil Mullarkey, ImprovYourBusiness
    Apr 29 2026
    You couldn't make it up. But Neil Mullarkey does. He co-founded the World Famous Comedy Store Players with Mike Myers, appeared in the Austin Powers films, and has spent 40 years making things up in front of live audiences. For the last 27 years, he's been sharing those skills in boardrooms, with teams, and even with cybersecurity experts. His book In the Moment makes the case that the ability to listen, adapt, and build on what you're given isn't just good stagecraft. It's the most urgently needed skill in business. What's more, it's one that many teams and organisations struggle with. He argues, with warmth and hard‑won experience, that the same instincts that keep an improvised scene alive - listening, accepting an offer, and building on what’s been given - are the skills businesses desperately need to foster. In this conversation, I learn about Neil's journey into improv and we get into mistakes, blame, trust, failure, permission, laughter, silos, scripts, chaos, a soda syphon, and the surprising thing a room full of cardiologists taught Neil about improvising at the sharp end. Listen to find out: Why laughter matters and 'mistakes' are rich creative materialWhy the optimal team size is six, and what that has to do with improvWhat a cybersecurity crisis has in common with a night at the Comedy StoreWhat cardiologists told Neil that changed his mind about improv in businessWhy AI is making this deeply human skill more valuable, not less Links: Neil's book 'In the Moment': https://uk.bookshop.org/a/15792/9781398610767 More about Neil and ImprovYourBusiness: https://neilmullarkey.com/ Connect with Neil on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilmullarkey/ A rare appearance by Neil with the Comedy Store Players on Sunday May 10th: https://www.comedystoreplayers.com/events/comedy-store-10052026 Chapters: 0:01:44 - More than a jolly: when to use improv and when not to 0:05:28 - How do you make it stick? 0:08:09 - Hackathons and the improv vs. structure tension 0:12:20 - The meetings chapter: tell, decide or implement? 0:13:21 - Permission, leaders and curating questions 0:15:08 - Origin story: from soda siphon to Comedy Store Players 0:19:32 - Confidence, failure and the improv stage 0:22:07 - Do you rehearse improvisation? 0:30:11 - What business pain does improv training address? 0:33:42 - Improv and cybersecurity crisis management 0:36:23 - The show must go on: mistakes, blame and Miles Davis 0:39:21 - Two pizza teams and the optimal team size 0:46:22 - Has anything changed in 27 years? AI and the human element 0:48:55 - Silos, shadowing and equifinality 0:53:05 - Improv or Best Practice? The cardiologists story -- Thanks for listening. Curious Business is here to bring you insights, experiences and ideas from founders, leaders and experts to help you think differently about your business and its marketing. My name is Stephen Morris and I help start-ups and scale-ups get momentum in their marketing and pipeline. Like to know more? Book a discovery call: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/discovery/ Or sign-up to 'The Prompt' my monthly newsletter: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/signup/ If you'd like to talk about how podcasts can build reach, enhance authority and fuel your pipeline, visit: www.curiousbusiness.co.uk.
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    58 mins
  • The podcast production expert without a podcast: Chris Stone

    The podcast production expert without a podcast: Chris Stone
    Apr 14 2026
    Chris Stone has spent 13 years making podcasts for major UK publishers including the Telegraph, the Evening Standard and the New Statesman. He writes Podcast Strategy Weekly on Substack and is building Podcast Crew, a vetted hiring marketplace for the podcast production industry. But why doesn't he have a podcast himself? Listen to find out why. In this conversation, Chris challenges some of the most common assumptions podcasters hold: that social clips drive listeners, that video is for young audiences, and that everyone who wants to grow their business should start a show. He also has a lot to say about where podcasting is heading — and why AI and podcasts are good news for live, in-person events. Listen to this episode to find out: Why a man who has spent 13 years making podcasts for a living doesn't have oneThe question Chris asks every podcaster he meets, and why they often can't answer itWhat social clips from your podcast are actually forWhy AI and podcasts are good for another, more conventional, mediumThe dark web podcast Chris thinks everyone should hearWhy podcasts might be the most powerful community-building tool available right now Chapters: 03:10 – The Telegraph, Prince Harry, and Bryony Gordon's Mad World 04:45 – Building the New Statesman's podcast from a cupboard to 200k YouTube subscribers 07:47 – The three skills that make podcasting work 09:46 – Going off-the-cuff at the Labour Party conference 12:08 – Why Chris started writing Podcast Strategy Weekly 16:06 – Why a podcast producer deliberately doesn't have a podcast 20:04 – How B2B podcasts build trust (and why that matters more than reach) 21:30 – The case for video in podcasting 24:37 – What social clips are actually for (it's not what you think) 29:56 – Why hiring in podcasting is broken 32:11 – Building on Airtable and Softr with a developer from Upwork 34:18 – The podcast everyone should hear 38:05 – Three big opportunities in podcasting right now Links: Podcast Strategy Weekly: https://podcaststrategy.substack.com/Podcast Crew: https://www.podcastcrew.co.uk/Connect with Chris on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisstonetv/Kill List podcast: search on any podcast app: https://wondery.com/shows/kill-list/ -- Thanks for listening. Curious Business is here to bring you insights, experiences and ideas from founders, leaders and experts to help you think differently about your business and its marketing. My name is Stephen Morris and I help start-ups and scale-ups get momentum in their marketing and pipeline. Like to know more? Book a discovery call: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/discovery/ Or sign-up to 'The Prompt' my monthly newsletter: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/signup/ If you'd like to talk about how podcasts can build reach, enhance authority and fuel your pipeline, visit: www.curiousbusiness.co.uk.
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    39 mins
  • Is the software industry broken? Justin Megawarne of Megaslice

    Is the software industry broken? Justin Megawarne of Megaslice
    Mar 27 2026
    After growing up as a programmer, hating school, and being given a chance to follow his passion via an apprenticeship, Justin Megawarne is the co-founder of Megaslice, a technology consultancy with a difference. Justin progressed to consulting, software architecture and CTO roles. However, he became tired of seeing technically excellent work fail commercially. So, along with co-founder Mikal, he built Megaslice with a mission to let no good idea go to waste. In this episode, Justin argues that the tech industry is structurally set up to fail its clients - through broken billing models, misaligned incentives, and methodologies that function primarily as ways to transfer liability to the client. He makes the case for value pricing as the more ethical model, explains why the right quality in a founder isn't confidence but arrogance, and outlines his approach to shared risk and long-term client relationships. In this episode: What Nobel Prize-winning economics has to do with your software agencyWhy Hiring a Software Agency Is Like Buying a Used CarThe difference between outcomes and outputs — and why it mattersJust what is "the right level of arrogance" in a founder?The interview question Justin uses instead of a coding testWhy Megaslice says 'work from wherever it makes sense' to its teamWhy 'specialisation is for insects'The single most important thing founders tend to get backwards Links: More about Megaslice: https://megaslice.uk/ Connect with Justin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmegawarne/ Chapters: 0:01:06 - Megaslice and Justin's background 0:06:33 - The Lemon Market problem 0:10:41 - Time and materials, Agile, and broken industry incentives 0:13:42 - Interest alignment and giving clients what they need 0:16:33 - Qualifying clients — founder profile, arrogance, and capital 0:21:48 - Why organisations find software so difficult 0:26:14 - Why start a company — and how Megaslice has changed 0:28:27 - Hiring for intrinsic motivation — and the hi-vis jacket story 0:35:01 - The biggest thing founders get wrong 0:38:16 - Who inspires Justin — the crackpots of history -- Thanks for listening. Curious Business is here to bring you insights, experiences and ideas from founders, leaders and experts to help you think differently about your business and its marketing. My name is Stephen Morris and I help start-ups and scale-ups get momentum in their marketing and pipeline. Like to know more? Book a discovery call: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/discovery/ Or sign-up to 'The Prompt' my monthly newsletter: https://www.curiousbusiness.co.uk/signup/ If you'd like to talk about how podcasts can build reach, enhance authority and fuel your pipeline, visit: www.curiousbusiness.co.uk.
    Show More Show Less
    39 mins
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